Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Denim Tire Messenger Bag

I finally finished my tire messenger bag after a few false starts over the last year. I borrowed this idea from the inestimable Stephen over at Hizknits and made a few alterations. The biggest being my bag is half the side of his I wanted a new man purse but really enjoyed the overall design and so made it more loose and hippy oriented. Second I didn't want to foray into felting and so played around with other fibers and as a result had to stitch the tube to the bag (I hid the stitching under the tire straps.

As far as fiber goes the Body is made of Rowan Tweed .The rim of the bag flush with the tire and the straps of the bag are Rowan Denim in the Nashville shade. Finally the flap is the Rowan denim double stranded with a black Louisa Harding Yarn called Kashmere Aran.

The Rim came first with me slipping a stitch (like a sock heel) at every turn. I picked up a third of the stitches and knit up consuming a stitch by p2tog or K2 tog at the end of each row. Basically a U made up by the rim and consumed one stitch at a time working from the bottom of the bag to the top. I did the front first finishing off with a few rows of Denim in seed stitch to make the the curling a bit less prominent. Same process up the back except I left the stitches live to make the flap laterThere are five straps coming off the rim that are single stranded ( the rim is double stranded) that I made by picking up stitches length wise and then kitchener stitching into the opposite side of the rim. I Started with the centered strap in the bottom to try to maintain a bit of equilibriumand then moved up either side.The flap was a bit of whimsy on my part because it has a stripe of fair isle patterning near the top. Apparently the Rowan Denim fades like jeans and so the denim parts of the bag will become more contrasted.Elias was very interested in Flopper modeling my the new messenger bag before they headed out on their daily run.Now I'm going to take a nap before I make my feremented radishes.

2 comments:

So it looks like you didn't felt this at all? It still looks really good. I've seen it before, and never really thought I liked the idea of the inner tube in a bag! You will have to let us know how it is to use.